


Longing To Grow Into One (The Inked Remix)

by embroiderama



Category: White Collar
Genre: Angst, Backstory, First Time, M/M, Pre-OT3, Remix, Schmoop, Tattoos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-19
Updated: 2012-04-19
Packaged: 2017-11-03 23:00:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/386945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/embroiderama/pseuds/embroiderama
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neal was young when he got the tattoo, but it was a promise to himself, a reminder of his heart's true desire, a gift to himself that he'd never have to leave behind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Longing To Grow Into One (The Inked Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [storiesfortravellers](https://archiveofourown.org/users/storiesfortravellers/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Neal with a tattoo, schmoop ficlet](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/8027) by storiesfortravellers. 



> Thank you to J for the beta!

Neal had only been in New York for a couple of months, and he’d spent most of it living with this guy, an adjunct professor of philosophy at NYU, in his marginally not-crappy one-bedroom apartment. He was a decent guy, fifteen years older than Neal but not old. They both knew that they were using each other and that it was temporary, but it was good to not be alone and Neal knew that Michael would never stop him if he wanted to leave. If Michael asked him to leave, he had a roll of money stuck inside an empty deodorant container in his duffel bag, plenty to pay for a hostel for a few nights until he worked something else out.

Neal was working a real job then, waiting tables and making a killing in tips because he was _awesome_ at upselling, and somehow the customers loved him for it. He used some of that money to buy into backgammon or card games, and every bit of his winnings went into his stash. Rainy days when he didn’t have a shift at work or anything else he needed to do, Neal liked to lay around on Michael’s Ikea furniture and read some of his philosophy books. The modern stuff was dry and boring, put him to sleep more than anything else, but the classics were something else entirely.

He went to The Strand and bought a copy of Plato’s Symposium in the original Greek, along with a _Teach Yourself Ancient Greek_ book, and he worked through it, learning the shapes of the letters and the forms of the words one by one on those lonely, rainy weekday afternoons. He loved the language, and he imagined reading them in Greece, not amongst the ruins but in a hotel room with fine, soft linens washed in sunlight, a thick mattresses on a hand-carved bed, a tray of honey-soaked pastries laid out on the bed beside Neal and…somebody, the person he knew he would find one day who would make him feel real and complete and okay.

The lines about people having been torn in two, only to forever seek the person who is truly the other half of themselves, were Neal’s favorites, drawing his eye back again and again until he could see the words in Greek behind his eyes as he was falling asleep next to Michael. Michael, who meant shelter and friendship and sex, but wasn’t ever going to be Neal’s missing half.

Neal could scarcely imagine what it would be like, feeling that kind of completion and belonging. He’d never really felt a part of anything, not the broken ruin of his family, not the kids at school who always seemed to live in a different world. He’d left that place with little more than enough money for bus fare, and when he got off the bus he picked the pocket of the pushy jerk who’d been hitting on him for the better part of twelve hours. It was a start and Neal knew, in the same deep down inside way he’d known he had to leave home before something happened that he could never escape, that the future held better things for him. Beautiful things. Everything.

Most of the people Neal worked with at the restaurant had tattoos, all kinds of ink and piercings that could be hidden by white button-down shirts and black pants and skirts, but Neal had never loved the idea of permanently marking his body that way. He’d always viewed the fuzzy old tattoos on his step-father’s arms as marks of his stupidity, his complete and utter lack of class and good judgment, but what he saw on his co-workers was different. Some of it was ugly or pointless or clichéd, but some of it was beautiful, and there was something appealing about buying something for himself, something that he could never be forced to leave behind, art that would live on his skin. One of the waitresses showed him the line of poetry she had tattooed along the curving line of her clavicle; she said it was her favorite part of her body and the ink was her gift to it.

One evening, one of his favorite customers left him a hundred dollar tip and instead of squirreling it away or turning it into more money he decided to get a tattoo of his own. He knew just what he wanted, and he drew it himself on a blank sheet of paper, forming the Greek letters just right for the acronym of his favorite bit of Plato. _Man is always looking for his other half._ He wanted it to be a reminder--that he wouldn't always be alone, and that everybody felt alone until they found their other half, that he should never stop looking.

When anybody asked him what his favorite feature was, he always said his eyes. People expected it and didn't question it, and he did like his eyes well enough even if they reminded him too much of his mother. But his secret favorite thing about his own body was his hipbones, the way they lurked just under the surface of the skin, the round, strong feel of them as he swirled his thumb around them in the shower. They weren't quite prominent--not anymore--but he loved them, and the tattoo would be a reminder of that, too.

He went alone to the tattoo parlor in Chelsea, and it hurt, hurt worse than he had imagined. The needle felt like it was digging under his skin to scrape the bone, rattling through his pelvis. He closed his eyes and didn't cry and rode the wave of pain straight into exhilaration. He went home and climbed into bed with Michael, straddling his hips naked and eager to get Michael inside him.

“What’s this?” Michael asked, running his thumb over the bandage on Neal’s hip.

Neal peeled back the bandage to show Michael the design, and Michael examined it with an arched eyebrow.

“You’re such a fucking romantic,” he said, making it sound like a bad thing. “There’s nobody out there waiting for you other than your next fuck and the one after that. Or maybe you’ll decide to marry some girl, but I promise you she won’t be anything like your other half.”

Neal moved up and off of Michael’s lap and covered himself with the sheet, feeling suddenly cold and exposed. “You don’t know what’s out there for me. Neither do I, but I’m going to find out.”

“You’ll find out that we’re all nothing more than a bunch of ants crawling around in a trash can, taking what we want and bumping up against each other from time to time. You keep looking for meaning you’ll make yourself crazy.”

Neal backed off of the bed and stood up, pulling on his underwear. “I wasn’t looking for meaning here, but I’m not an ant. I’ll never be an ant.”

Michael just shook his head, and Neal slept on the sofa that night. In the morning, he left with his overstuffed backpack, and he had to leave his books behind but he carried the words on his body and in his mind, and that was enough. He moved on, and the world never failed him. He didn’t have everything he wanted, not even close, but he always had somewhere decent to sleep, beautiful things to see, art to make, money and shiny things passing into his hands.

When he met Kate, he wanted to believe that she was the one he’d been looking for, his other half. He tried to ignore the ways they didn’t fit because he loved her, loved her and wanted her so much that it hurt sometimes. She thought the tattoo on his hip was cute and sexy, but he didn’t see in her eyes a reflection what he felt about it, the truth of it that sat deep inside. But he held onto her and sought after her when she was gone because he didn’t want to give up the hope that if everything could just be right then he and Kate would fit together like two parts of the whole person that Neal so desperately wanted to be.

Now, so many years later the ink is such a part of him that sometimes he forgets it's there until he catches sight of it. He still likes to rub his thumb over that rounded edge of bone lurking under the surface and think about how exquisitely sensitive the tattoo had been for months, how the movement of clothing over it had made him aware of every motion of his hips. But eventually it healed up and became a more silent reminder of his dreams, the hopes he'd never quite managed to abandon even while behind bars.

The letters on his skin could tell his secret to anyone willing to listen, and Neal should have known that Peter would be one of those few. So he lied and blamed the tattoo on Jack Daniels and youthful pretensions, and if Peter looked like he didn't quite buy the story he didn't say anything. He just kissed the ink again before opening his mouth and sucking lightly on the curve of the bone underneath. Neal could barely breathe, barely believe that this was real--Peter kneeling over him, exploring his body like he was memorizing every detail.

Peter finally moved on from Neal's hips to what lay between them, nuzzling at his balls before wrapping one hand around the base of Neal's half-hard cock and lowering his mouth over the rest, a rush of wet heat that Neal hadn't felt for far too long. He bit his lip against the surge of pleasure and tasted a trace of Elizabeth's lipstick; she'd kissed them both deeply before leaving--her blessing, her love, both so abundant.

Neal's thoughts fell apart into immediacy and need and then the harsh current of air through his lungs as he came in Peter's hands and then lay on the bed with every part of his body soft and relaxed as Peter watched him with warm, dark eyes. Neal had gotten Peter off first, just surged in against his awkward hesitation, dropped to his knees and unzipped Peter's pants, took the weight of Peter's cock into his mouth the way he'd wanted to for so very long, for years. Neal never wanted to forget the sounds Peter made when he came or the way he’d knelt down in front of Neal afterward and rested his head on Neal's shoulder, breathing hot gusts of air against Neal's neck.

Now they were both satisfied, lax and replete, and Peter crawled up the bed to lay down next to Neal, dragging the coverlet from the bottom of the bed up with him to cover them both. Neal didn't say anything, just breathed in the smell of Peter's cologne and sweat and sex and listened to Peter's breathing fall into synch with his. When he met Elizabeth, Neal knew that Peter had found his true other half, and they were so whole together, so beautiful. That beauty broke Neal's heart because he'd never felt like the convoluted edges of himself fit better than when he was with them--both of them, either of them, even before they all decided to take their friendship further.

Neal wondered sometimes, in his most hopeful moments, if there couldn't be some other kind of math, an equation where three halves could make a whole. He turned on his side, slipped an arm around Peter's broad chest, and fell asleep wondering if he was finally and truly _home_.


End file.
